StandOff in Lumiose
by The Canadian Infernape
Summary: Lumiose City is in lockdown, its citizens in danger from a dangerous criminal gang running the city, and Ash and co. are not immune to the dangerous streets. However, when a bewildering event occurs, Ash and his friends must depend on each other like never before to survive the violence within the city.
1. Prologue

**A/N: **Hey guys! Sorry Dream Mist had to be cancelled on such short notice. I just didn't like where it was going and I wanted to try something different. So, here it is, Stand/Off. Enjoy!

**Rated:** T - M (Violence, Swearing)

**Shipping: **_Amourshipping (Ash x Serena), Implied GrowingUpshipping (Emma x Trainer)_

* * *

Prologue

It was a clear, summer's day in Lumiose City, with many civilians grouped along the sidewalk and Lumi cabs and cars bustling along the main roads, the gigantic view of Prism Tower standing over in the center of the city. It seemed like another average day in the big city.

Usually, civilians would flock over towards the likes of the dazzling Boutique Couture, with some of the finest clothing in Lumiose, or Furfrou trainers ready to get their fine Pokemon groomed. However, one of these civilians wasn't here to shop, or sightsee. It's not because he wasn't into these things, or he was out of money.

He was on a mission.

A boy, possibly fifteen years old, walked through the crowds of Lumiose, steadily pacing himself while spying on a certain target in the crowd. He was wearing all black. A black Fedora on his head with short, short, raven hair, wearing a dark zipped shirt. His sunglasses overshadowed his eyes, as he walked within a passing crowd of tourists, trying to fit in, so his wandering target wouldn't notice as the boy kept a clear visual.

The target was a muscular man, with dyed red hair, donning a thick leather jacket with the logo of a black-shaded Gengar sewn onto the back. The man seemed to be trying to fit in with the crowd as well, as he tried to get to his point.

Following close behind, the boy, trying not to make a scene, whispered into his hands-free device,

"That's the man we're looking for?"

The girl on the other end of the phone, who seemed about sixteen, replied with her thick accent. "Keep following him. That man has been linked to criminal gang activities. I warn you though, he's pretty dangerous. I'm keeping watch from a distance."

"Copy that."

The teen boy kept following the man as he dodged left into an abandoned alleyway clogged between two buildings along the street, making sure he went undetected.

The walls of the narrow alleyway was slapped with torn up posters and graffiti on the wall, with soda cans and plastic galette dishes across the ground and trash from a gray, steel can that had been kicked over by someone. The boy, sensing danger lurking inside the dark gloomy alleyway, slowly walked in and braced himself for an attack.

As he walked in the alley, the boy recognized a shadowy figure move alongside the wall behind him, and was taken aback. As he slowly turned back, he prayed the person behind him wasn't an adversary.

"Oi, some kid came here lookin' for trouble," the menacing voice spoke. The man covering the opening the boy was small and fat, with a darker toned skin colour. His face with covered with long, dark facial hair. "Wanna deal with them personally, Rickety?"

As the boy looked back towards the insides of the alley, he saw the red haired man, standing with a toothy grin. He stood menacingly with his hand on his hip, as he looked as the cornered boy looked around.

"Ay, Pudge," 'Rickety' replied, "Stupid kid. Must've followed me."

"Didn't his mom tell him to stay off these fucking streets," Pudge said in a mocking tone. "Let's teach this kid a lesson about the threats of gang activity."

As Pudge and Rickety approached the raven-haired boy, the boy quickly grasped through the pockets of his shirts, revealing a single solitary Poke-ball.

"Charizard!" the boy called out, "Help me out here!" He threw the Pokeball in the air, as it revealed the winged Pokemon with the flaming tail.

Charizard let out a mighty roar, seeking vengeance from the two criminals.

"Oi, so it's a battle this kid wants! Fair enough. Go, Crobat!" Pudge shouted as he released a Purple-winged Pokemon from the ball.

"Cro-bat!"

"Go Banette!" shouted Rickety, as he sent out his Banette.

As the Pokemon were settled, both sides of the fight waited in anticipation of who would strike first. Finally, the boy decided to settle the dust.

"Charizard! Use Blast Burn on Banette!" he called, as Charizard heartily obeyed, unleashing a gush of flames from its mouth and hitting Rickety's Pokemon with flames and flat-out rage.

The Banette, trying to keep itself up, could not withstand the flares that had hit it, and collapsed, out of energy.

"Holy shit," said Pudge, "We don't stand a chance against that boy!"

_Oh well,_ thought Rickety, _If we cannot win ourselves, we gotta at least try to get away. _

"Alright, Crobat, use Crunch on that kid!"

"Wha?" the boy yelped in confusion.

Soon, confusion turned into horror as Crobat sunk his teeth into the boy's thigh, and within every bite the boy felt a raging pain. Right as the painful gnawing stopped, the boy collapsed and looked at the bite marks. The bites caused the blood to gush from his thigh, and a pool of blood was caught under his pant leg, which had been stained red.

"Charizard... return..." The boy said as he felt himself losing energy, whereas for him, everything turned black.

"Dude man, we might've fucking killed that dude, what should we do?"

"Don't panic, he probably just passed out from exhaustion," Rickety said, uncertainly, "Let's take his body. Nobody saw ANYTHING, right?"

As the two gang members began tugging his body, they heard a voice from far-off cry, "Stop, you crooks!"

A figure in a black robotic suit leaped off from a building above and landed right near the body of the boy, as it looked frightfully at the body next to her. It then focused her attention back onto the two criminals, and upon recognizing the robotic suit, a feeling of fright ran down their spines.

"E... Ess... E..." suttered Pudge, trying to back off and run away.

"Fucking Arceus, let's just run!" yelled Rickety, as the two men ran towards the alleyway exit and were never seen again.

The figure was about to give chase, when she remembered her companion helplessly lying on the floor. When the boy regained consciousness, he saw the figure, and he said,

"What... too... took you... so long, Emma?"

"Shh..." Emma replied, putting her steel, protected, hand on top of the boy to stop the boy's bleeding, "Jayson, I'm Essentia, remember?"

"Ugh... not now..." replied Jayson, "They've fucking done it. I'm done for..."

"No, no, no... Let me take you to the hospital. Emma'll be there once you're settled down," Essentia soothed.

Using her gained strength and speed from the suit, Essentia carried Jayson in her arms and stopped in front of the building that read 'LUMIOSE GENERAL HOSPITAL' and laid his unconscious body in front of the doorstep.

She then dashed off, on the way back to her homestead, Looker Bureau, tears welled from her eyes.

_"Please get well, Jayson, I still need you..."_

* * *

**A/N:** That covers it for the Prologue. Thanks for reading!


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

As Ash and his three other friends, Clemont, Bonnie, and Serena travelled back towards Lumiose City, all four of them were tired and drowsy, having endured the harsh climate of the Lumiose Badlands of Route 13. The Lumiose Badlands had been harsh on the gang, as they were both hungry and tired, due to a lack of water, the everlasting heat, and the fact the gang travelled nonstop for the whole day without any food. The sun was beginning to set, as all four wanted to get back to civilization as quickly as possible.

"So... Tired..." Ash moaned, his energetic and upbeat attitude now drained from the obstacles that they had now conquered.

Pikachu, on its fellow trainer's shoulder, was sweating a pool of sweat, locked in a battle between its bodily endurance and the harsh climate it was up against. "Pika..."

"Wait up... guys..." Clemont said, drained, lagging behind as the citrus-haired boy tried to keep up with his three other companions.

"Ugh, so slow, brother! Have you ever considered working out?" scolded the boy's sister, Bonnie. Her energy was slightly downed, as she was sweating crazily, but her energetic attitude matched the red hatted boy's, except a bit more than usual.

"Ugggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg..." The pink hatted girl, wearing a red skirt with a black collared top, moaned as she began dragging her shoes across the barren landscape. "Is there a hotel coming up?"

"Ah, silly Serena," taunted the lemon-haired girl. "We're almost there."

"Well...," Ash replied, with a tone of both excitement and drowsiness, pointed at Clemont and said, "I can't wait to beat, _huff,_ You in a battle..."

"We'll..." Clemont panted, "See about... that..." as he tried to keep his body uplift and stamina up.

The four kids then continued along the route, beginning to make their entrance into the huge, expansive city.

* * *

_Ugh... What happened..._

As Jayson began to open his eyes, his blurred vision prohibited him from seeing his surroundings as he tried to scan his eyes around the space he was in. As his vision began to recover, he tried to get up from his position, only to find himself paralyzed to the soft surface underneath him. As his eyes finally cleared up, he saw himself, his leg extended upward into a cast, red stains all over white leathering. Around him was a single, shaded window, along with the freshly painted white walls, monitors and other technological machinery on his left. Jayson also noticed a figure, a girl with dark skin, curly black hair, her tattered blue shirt shining in the gaze of his eye.

Emma.

Ecstasy turned to frustration and anger at the sight of her. _She_ was the reason he was in this room, paralyzed and unable to move.

"Hiya, Jayson," said Emma's cheerful voice, as Jayson turned his head away from her blue eyes, oh, the blue eyes that made him swell up, but as Jayson felt, his anger had the better of him. Emma was, however, oblivious of this, cooed, "How are you feeling, pardner?"

"Good," Jayson responded, when in fact his emotions displayed the opposite, trying to keep his feeling of soul-crushing anger in.

"So are you expected out of the hospital soon?"

"Hmm. Gonna fix me up during the surgery. Isn't that bad, just a flesh wound. Should be ready to go tomorrow," Jayson stiffly answered.

"Aw, it's gonna be alright," Emma sympathised with him.

Jayson, his bubbled emotions from inside, were let out at the expense of ruining their rather mutually fraternal relationship.

"Don't give me that," Jayson grumbled as he tried to turn away from the girl's innocent face, "Why the hell didn't you come earlier to help me, otherwise I wouldn't have been in this cast and beaten up."

Soon, the girl's smiling face turned to irritation to her partner's sullen attitude. "Wha..." she replied in shock, "What do you mean...?"

"You damn know why I am here, Emma," Jayson replied angrily, "We went to take care of some business, you were supposed to have my back, and you, having all those enhanced superpowers, couldn't stop that Crobat from sinking its teeth into my leg. Now, I'm here, unable to come back to Looker Bureau, because you were too slow to help."

"But...," Emma said, a crushed face after his unexpected response, but Jayson cut him off.

"No buts, Emma..." Jayson harshly said, as he soon turned to a more depressed state, and the raven-haired boy began to swell up in tears.

"Look at this," he cried to Emma bitterly, gesturing to his wounded leg, "Look at what these fucking gangsters did to my leg, they could've killed me that night. You're Essentia, the most superpowered human in Kalos, or possibly in the world, you can save all the people in Lumiose, and yet you couldn't arrive in time to help me."

"I'm sorry, please forgive me," Emma said welling up in tears as she slowly collapsed on her knees, hands covering her crestfallen face.

A shrewd silence stirred between the two companions in that room, as tears between both friends. Jayson realized the agonizing pain he had suffered onto his friend, his comrade, his partner, and was ready to undo the damage between their partnership as of his moment.

"I'm sor..." Jayson tried to squeak in, but was cut off with Emma bursting into sobs, bursting right past the painted wooden door, her eyes flooded with her tears.

Jayson slumped back onto his bed, in disbelief of what he had just done. He was in for a long haul once he got back to the Looker Bureau.

* * *

Meanwhile, in an abandoned, multiple-storeyed building, on approximately the 3rd level of building, two men were chatting among-st themselves. But these weren't just ordinary men.

These two men occupied an apartment building with its walls torn, food crumbs scattered across the carpeted floors, and two gang members slouched on the red sofa couch, watching the day's football match between FC Lumiose and the Camphrier Royals FC.

One of them was tightly dressed all in black, wearing a Camo cap as well as a flack leather jacket, and wearing shades covering his bright blue eye colour. The other man posessed slanted eyes, blue jeans with a t-shirt covered with a skull emblem, and chains linked around his pant leg, as well as his arms. These were gangsters, but not the ordinary type of punk guys and girls as seen from the former Lumiose Gang, working with the police now, no. These gangsters were possibly the most dangerous street gang in the whole city, and had the crime-rate of the city soaring to Oblivion. They were from the gang known as _The Darkest Gengars._

"'Ey X!" the man in black, who was better known as Oscar, called to the chained gang member, "Pass me som' of dat beer from the fridge!"

The gangster with the chains, didn't have a name. Instead he went by a code-name the gang knew him as _X_, or _Rated X_. He responded to Oscar in a surly attitude, too stoned from his beer to get some for his fellow gang member, "No can do, mah man, go walk yourself, you have feet."

"Ey! You have feet too, you fat fuck!" shouted Oscar, which made X scowl with anger, but before a fistfight could escalate between the two, a strong knocking slammed on their door.

"Go get it, X!" shouted Oscar, with a teasing tone in his voice.

"Fiiiinneeee..." Rated X panted, but not before flipping off his fellow gangster.

X looked through the peephole of the wooden door, staying alert to make sure it wasn't anyone from the side of the law. But to these members, they weren't afraid to attack anybody, whether you were an ordinary civilian or a skilled cop. The police were way too scared to deal with such a big-time gang as the Darkest Gengars, so they mostly stayed away from them.

As X peeped out, he saw the two fellow members, a fat man with a dark skin tone, and a skinnier red haired man. X immediately noticed the two to be gang members, as well as X and Oscar's other friends, Pudge and Rickety.

X, with the relief of not planning to escape, opened the door for his friends, "Wassup?"

"Oi, I don't know about you, but we're in deep shit right now!" Pudge immediately squeaked in.

Rated X began grumbling and slapped his hand to his face in disbelief. "What the hell did you guys do this time?"

"Essentia and her little gang are after us, ready to fire our asses, that's one!" finished Rickety in a panicked tone?

"So?" X responded unamused to his two friends, with his hands to his hips.

Rickety's face went from glum and panicked, to a sneaky, villainous grin. "Which means we have to lay lower than usual for the 'bust' Delta wanted tonight, bro."

Smirks spread around the three men, and soon Rated X retreated back to the living room and began shouting commands to Oscar. "Dude! We gotta bust tonight, Delta's orders! Get the Electrodes ready!"

* * *

Delta was, obviously, the leader of the Darkest Gengars. He was a man 'hiding in the shadows, waiting for the moment to strike', as the fellow Gengars had said. Delta barely showed himself to any of his henchmen, he would normally call his fellow Gengars by telephone whenever he wanted something done, and the gang members didn't dare disobey the superior's voice. Rinse and Repeat.

The mission Delta assigned to his four experienced inferiors was no exception. Delta was a man who thought carefully, planned every robbery, and had a tactical plan to make sure none of his hitmen were captured or killed in the process.

Today's mission consisted of hiding out in Vernal Avenue, keeping a low profile, then proceeding to rob the Boutique Couture without any staff or civilians getting hurt. Obviously the Gengars didn't want to cause a scene.

The plan was starting to work perfectly when Rated X came in to see no shoppers on the first floor, just the cashier. _This is gonna be so easy_, thought Rated X as he strolled into the store, pacing himself as though it was another shopping day for him.

He scanned his eyes at the store, peering at every shelf, holding clothing up high into the light for him to scan it clearly, and finally picked out the right clothing. Once he was done, he waddled himself over to the front counter and put his hand on the counter, whistling a tune, trying to attract the attention of the female salesclerk, who was then preoccupied with sorting.

As expected, when the blond cashier was done, she straddled over to X, and as store policy would've said it, "Can I help you?"

"Nuthing much, just wanna buy these clothing for mah girl," X said, showing the women several skirts and pantyhoses.

As she scanned for the prices of X's clothing, X immediately pulled out a Pokeball, and aggressively demanded, "Gimme the fucking money from the damn cash register, or I call my fucking Electrode to blow this store to the high place where Arceus is!"

The cashier then started to panick and began to loosely threaten X. "I'm calling the cops!"

"I suggest that isn't the smartest thing to do." X replied, as Pudge came in with his Banette, and Oscar with his Tyrannitar, ready to attack.

"Please don't hurt me... just please..." the cash register tearily said, defeated by the strength of her captors.

"We aren't gonna kill you," Rated X reassured harshly, "We're just gonna make you never forget this, and we'll take our money and run."

X then called out for his Lucario, as the blue Jackal-like Pokemon let out a deafening roar. "Lucario! Use Mach Punch!"

Lucario obeyed without any empathy for its victim, as it punched the cashier square in the head, with the fury of the Pokemon being shown through the swift impact Lucario had inflicted. The cashier had a deep bruise on her noggin, as she fell back and blacked out, slumped on the marbled floor of the Boutique.

Pudge checked the woman's pant pockets for a key to the register, and with luck, opened the cash register, gathering the money while laughing to Rated X, "Oi, I really hope she's still alive after this shit."

"Don't talk now," Oscar cried in a panicked tone, hoping authorities wouldn't come, "Don't want the rats to come searchin' for us!"

As with that, the three men escaped hurriedly, and escaped in the getaway car supplied by Rickety.


	3. Chapter 2

_**A/N: GAH! Sorry this took so long! My god, where the fuck do I spend my free time nowadays? Anyways, here's Chapter 2 for ya!**_

* * *

Chapter 2

Back at one of the five entranceways into the ever-large Lumiose City, the four kids slowly and drowsily made their way into the city, finding the lustrous shine of Prism Tower greeting them from afar.

"Hey, look! It's Prism Tower," yelled Ash as he excitedly ran ahead of the group, staring in awe at its majestic structuring.

"Uh, yeah, Ash. It's like we've been here before," Bonnie replied to Ash's statement sarcastically. Ash beared no attention, as him and Bonnie ran up ahead on the street, leaving the tired Clemont and Serena trailing behind the two in plain exhaustion.

"How do those two still have energy after this," Serena mumbled, as both her and the citrus-coloured boy dragged along, on the verge of collapse.

As the group traveled along the ever-busy Vernal Avenue, Ash and Bonnie stopped their paced jog viewing a grimly sight.

Near the side of the street, the ever dazzling Boutique Couture was surrounded with different police cars, the side of the street blazing with red and blue sirens, as well as an ambulance. The store had its windows and glass doors shattered. Coming out of the store, two medical personnel were dragging the body of a woman on a stretcher, a facemask covering her mouth and nose.

"Woah, what happened," Ash breathed out, as Clemont and Serena slowly caught up to them to realize the sudden horror that Clemont and Bonnie were witnessing.

"Hey kids," a woman's voice yelled from one of the police cars, "It's not safe to be around here, _they_ might come back!"

She had short green hair, donning a Kalos police uniform with perfectly applied crimson lipstick, as she frightfully warned the kids of the sudden danger of the crime scene. To Ash and his gang, her appearance was unmistakable.

"Officer Jenny," shouted Ash, they had met several of her relatives before, all of them, ironically, named Officer Jenny. "What's going on here?"

"Robbery," Officer Jenny inquired, "Some people broke in, attacked the store clerk, and made away with the store's money."

"That's terrible," Serena shuttered in agony, as the four of the kids looked at the unconscious body lying with a respirator across her mouth. "Who would've done such a thing?"

"We believe it is the Darkest Gengars. Criminal gang that has been around the city quite a bit. Pretty dangerous around these parts," the green-haired officer filled in.

Bonnie, usually happy-go-lucky, was now peering at the clerk's lifeless body shuddering in agony, pondered, "Will she be alright?"

"She'll be fine," Jenny said, trying to make Bonnie feel better, "She's just been hit rather hard in the head, but it's nothing serious."

The group scanned their eyes around the scene of the crime, the center of their attention lifted as the stretcher was lifted into an oncoming ambulance. The woman's eyes were shut closed as though she were just asleep. Was she really _fine_?

* * *

_"Alright, it's all done."_

Antiseptic was definitely the hero in Jayson's books today. He woke up in a daze, scanning the area around him. A nurse with light green cloaking and a mask was shaking him. He saw the window next to him, with the city buildings being shone on by the sun, but what caught Jayson's eyes the most was his leg. It was no longer locked in leather, hoistered up in a sling, he discovered his own leg, bare as the eye could see. His leg was still splattered, dried blood caressing his skin and making his skin reek of the red substance, the bite marks were no longer there. Instead, several strings held together the skin and covered the red spaces in the middle of somewhat soft skin.

Jayson sat up on the hospital bed, ready to be mobile again, and more importantly at this point, return to the Looker Bureau to make up for the hurt he had afflicted to his partner. But before he could accomplish this feat, he was held back by the operating nurse.

"Woah, slow down, might hurt a bit when you walk."

He stood up, his bare feat touching the porcelain floor, and to the nurse's credit, she was right. Jayson's shin began swelling up and felt pain where the stitches were. Surprised by the sudden existance of throbbing pain on his shin, he almost staggered backwards onto the bed, only to fall into the arms of the nurse.

_This is gonna take a little getting used to._ thought Jayson as he lay in the Nurse's arms, only for Jayson to push himself back up and try walking again.

_"Fear is your true enemy. You can choose to stand up to it and easily conquer it, or let the doubts consume yourself."_ Jayson had once said this to Emma during one of their cases, and both of them remembered this quote, which both had admitted that remembering this made them more fearless during dangerous, even deadly tasks the two had to accomplish at the Looker Bureau.

After getting up again, Jayson pushed himself off the bed and began to walk again, enduring and cringing the pain on his leg.

As Jayson walked through the corridor, standing near the silver-iron elevators, he noticed the nurse, her nurse uniform and jet black hair over her shoulders, standing beside him, a look on her face with admiration.

"Tell me," she asked Jayson shakily, with a bit of gleefulness, "What was your name again?"

"Jayson." he replied briefly.

"Ah, Jayson, no wonder," the nurse muttered, as her memory drifted back to several days ago. "You mean _the_ Jayson, of the Looker Squad with Essentia!" Jayson nodded sincerely to the nurse's statement, keeping his eyes fixed to the floor.

"You would never guess how grateful my aunt was when you rescued her Pokemon! You and Essentia really taught that thief," she said excitedly, just as Jayson put up his hand up.

"Madam, it is just my duty," Jayson replied solemnly. He never thought of himself like an arrogant superhero you would see on television, but as an average person doing something he was supposed to. Because it was polite, nice, noble, it didn't matter. For him, his good deeds were triggered because it seemed right.

After greeting the nurse with a quick goodbye, Jayson shoved his hands into the skin pockets of his dark leather jacket, roaming the sidewalks of the ever busy streets of Lumiose.

Although he had originally lived in a smaller town, Jayson had steadily grown into the ever demanding excitement and expressive noises on the streets. Yet he did not embrace the nature, or even like the huge city. It was all just neutral landforms, something in the way

As he continued on the streets of Lumiose, he ducked to his left into an alleyway consisting of two buildings, a sushi restaurant, to which Jayson could stand its food, barely, and on the left of that was his homestead, known as the Looker Bureau, which he had consistently walked in and out of the green doorframe, always taking out his golden key from his jacket pocket, and inserting the key into the hole with a little twist. The green door was an obstacle Jayson had considered something that just got in his way. Wasted time.

"Emma! I'm back," Jayson called out, expecting the outgoing voice of the poised sixteen year old girl, excited to see him home. Instead, the response he got was dead silence. He peeked around the complex for Mimi, Emma's little Espurr friend. As Jayson had expected, Mimi's piercing purple eyes would usually keep its eyes fixed on him once he entered the door, on the entrance rug, staring. This time, the grey-coated Pokemon was not seen there, nor anywhere in the house. This was not abnormal, as Jayson remembered that Emma would usually walk Mimi.

With this withstanding question finally out of the way, Jayson decided to wait for Emma to get back as he slumped onto the brown fabric couch. He picked up a magazine that was slewn on the surface of the wooden coffee table adjacent to the couch that Jayson was sitting on. However, ever since he had lost a massive amount of blood from the injury last night, Jayson had began to slip into fatigue more than often before, and before he could comprehend it, he had been knocked out cold on the couch. The magazine slowly slid out of his hand and eventually fell on the floor, its pages still left open on the wood planked floor beneath it.

* * *

_As Jayson woke up, he saw he was in a dark room, all around him was darkness. _

_He could see nothing in front of him, and as Jayson reached forward, he felt what felt like a piece of wool in front of him, as he firmly grasped the wool in his right, he slowly began moving his hands up, up, up, in complete blindness until he felt the wool had a giant hole in it,_

_This is a coat, he thought, I must be... No... _

_Jayson had remembered this dream. He could not forget this. As he hit one of the confining walls of the closet, he knocked his hand on a wooden door and slowly tried to find the doorknob, and just as his hand began to feel it, he twisted the door slightly, not to make a creaking noise that the old knob would make. Unfortunately, the knob broke into his hand as he began to rotate it. _

_"Shit," muttered Jayson. However, his irritation turned to bitter sorrow as he heard the commotion he had heard a long time ago. The eerie scream of a little girl from outside the dark closet followed by the voice, which eerily sounded just like Jayson's_

_"You sick psychopath!" screamed the voice, in complete rage. "Charizard! Use Blast Burn and show him no mercy!"_

_A mighty roar screamed, Suddenly, the ember began to engulf the closet that Jayson was in, and spread over the clothing and across the walls with him in it._ _Jayson trembled at the sight of the flame as he tried to back into the tight wall to avoid the blaze from burning and scarring him._

* * *

Jayson woke up with a start, to find a figure shaking him awake.

"Hey." the girl's voice said. It was Emma. "Are you alright? You were moaning in your sleep."

"I'm fine," Jayson groaned, "I just had a freaking nightmare." He placed his hand on his forehead, slapping his forehead with a mere touch as he spoke.

"You don't seem fine," Emma spoke in a suspicious tone, as she cautiously asked, "What did you dream about?"

"It was just about..." Jayson started, but then remembered that he was not supposed to tell Emma, so he continued with the lie he always used, "Just another dream about being chased by a hungry Ursaring!" Jayson managed a light chuckle after saying that, and luckily, Emma bought it.

"Ah, you and your Ursaring dreams," Emma laughed, as she then suggesting something to Jayson "Do you want me to cook something, it's like 6:00 PM, maybe some dinner will comfort you."

Jayson got up steadily, patting the back of his head, "Nah, it's fine. I'll cook."

But just as he made his way towards the kitchen to cook, he remembered what he wanted to say previously, as he turned to Emma and said,

"Eh, Emma? I'm really sorry for snapping at you like that at the hospital, I just, just..." Emma slowly began to look at him steadily, as she began to say,

"Hey, don't worry about it. We know this vigilantism job is hard on both of us, we just need to have each other's backs, right?" assured Emma while lightly caressing her hand on Jayson's back.

Jayson went to the oven, poured some water into the pan and began boiling carrots. He looked over slightly to the sofa while Emma lay on it comfortably in a state of mind, her Espurr resting itself on her lap happily. Jayson turned back to his task, with a small, drawn out smirk on his face.

* * *

"We're back, finally!" moaned Serena, as she laid on Clemont's family sofa panting in exhaustion.

"What's that, Serena?" Clemont questioned, as he awkwardly wiped his sandy glasses, a lasting sign of the Badlands for the gang, "So, are we just going to rest for now, cause I'm pretty sure those two would still like to," he said as he sarcastically gesturing his eyes toward the two excited people in their group, whereas Ash and Bonnie were staring outside at the street.

"Aw," Ash whined, after hearing the word 'rest'. "But I really wanted to challenge your gym today!"

"The Lumiose Gym needs maintenance, since I've been letting Clembot run. I haven't be able to maintain the gym in such a long time," explained Clemont, "Tomorrow, I promise you. I'll even wake up early tomorrow to be sure everything is checked up." Ash and Clemont shook at that deal with a very affirmative yes, while Pikachu yelped excitedly, ready for a new Gym battle the next day.

That night, Serena lay in her bed wide awake, although very sleepy, she could not resist reviewing the memories of her adventure, especially with her friends.

_I can't believe we've come this far,_ Serena thought with a contented sigh, _It's been so long, and we already have four gym badges, and here we are, back in the luminated city of Lumiose._

She recalled when Korrina joined their gang, learning about Mega-Evolution, the Summer Camp with Shauna, Trevor, and Tierno, and best of all... But before she could think about _him_ out loud, Serena's cheeks quivered and turned Magmar red upon what she herself was thinking about.

_Snap out of it, _she scolded herself lightly, _You know he doesn't want you, Ash has his other things to worry about, his Pokemon, winning the league, you can't let romance bar him down. Why do you think of such things?_

Serena thought up her own answers of the last question as she stroked her sleeping fox Pokemon, who looked very content indeed.


End file.
